League of Legends patch 7.9

League of Legends’ new patch is 7.9, the midseason 2017 patch. It introduces the tank update, reworking Maokai, Sejuani and Zac, as well as a host of balance and bug fixes. Plus: new Dark Star skins. Have a look below for all the information we’ve got.

LoL Patch 7.9 Release Date And Downtime

Patch 7.9 will release early on May 3. Release time is 3am PT for NA, 5am BST for EUW and 3am CET for EUNE. Keep an eye on the server maintenance page for the latest updates.

LoL Patch 7.9 Balance Changes

That out of the way, let’s start with the really important bit, shall we? What you need to remember is that stuff on the PBE like this is neither guaranteed to happen, nor to be in the next patch even if it does. This is what the folks over at Riot are thinking about doing. We’ve got the numbers on what’s changing, and a general guideline on which way each champion, item, mastery, summoner spell or rune is moving.

Riot have summarised much of it in their midseason spotlight:

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Patch 7.9 Tank Update

The following champions have been significantly reworked as part of a larger update to the tanks class. We’ve laid them out like new champions, as they essentially are, with full descriptions of all of their abilities. Changes to other champions are further down the page.

Maokai –reworked

Sap Magic (Passive)

Maokai gathers magical energy from the nature around him. Every [45-20] seconds, his next attack uses that energy to heal him for [10-130 + [4.5-10.5% max HP]]. It won’t trigger above 95% health.

Cooldown: 30/25/20 seconds at levels 1/6/17

Heal:

Base: 10/30/50/70/90/110/130 at levels1/6/9/11/13/15/17

Scaling: 4.5/5.5/6.5/7.5/8.5/9.5/10.5% at levels 1/6/9/11/13/15/17

Each time Maokai casts a spell or if struck by an enemy’s spell, Sap Magic’s cooldown is reduced by 4 seconds.

Bramble Smash (Q)

Cost: 45/50/55/60/65 mana

Cooldown: 8/7.5/7/6.5/6 seconds

Maokai smashes his fist into the ground, releasing a shockwave. Nearby enemies are knocked away from him (further the closer they are) and all affected enemies take 70/115/160/205/250 (+40% AP) magic damage and are slowed by 99% for 0.25 seconds.

Twisted Advance (W)

Cost: 60/65/70/75/80 mana

Cooldown: 13/12/11/10/9 seconds

Maokai transforms into a moving mass of roots, becoming untargetable and dashing to the target.

Upon arrival, he deals 50/75/100/125/150 (+40% AP) magic damage and roots the target for 1/1.1/1.2/1.3/1.4 second(s).

Saplings placed in brush last for 30/40/50/60/70 seconds and deal 100% extra damage over 2 seconds to all enemies hit. They also have a larger detonation radius.

Damage maxes out at 300 for non-champions, 600 in brush.

Nature’s Grasp (R)

Cost: 100 mana

Cooldown: 120/110/100 seconds

Maokai summons a colossal wall of brambles and thorns that slowly advances forwards, dealing 150/225/300 (+75% AP) magic damage and rooting any enemies struck for (0.6 to 2.4) seconds, increasing with distance traveled. Each root can only hit one champion.

An enemy that has been stunned by Sejuani cannot gain Frost stacks for 10/9/8 seconds (at levels 1/7/14).

Glacial Prison (R)

Cost: 100 mana

Cooldown: 120/100/80 seconds

Sejuani throws her True Ice bola that deals 100/125/150 (+40% AP) magic damage to the first enemy champion hit and stuns them for 1 second.

The bola becomes more powerful after it travels 400 range, doubling the stun duration and increasing damage to 150/250/350 (+80% AP)

Empowered bolas also create a storm that slows other enemies by 30%. After 2 seconds, the storm deals 150/250/350 (+80% AP) magic damage and slows by 80% for 3 seconds.

Here’s how all that looks:

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Title changed to Fury of the North.

Stats:

Armor decreased to 27 from 29.5

Armor growth increased to 4 from 3

Attack rangeincreased to 150 from 125

Attack damage decreased to 56 from 57.5

Attack damage growth decreased to 3 from 3.3

Attack speed decreaesd to 0.625 from 0.67

Attack speed growth increased to 3% from 1.45%

And some updated splash arts:

Sabretusk Sejuani

Darkrider Sejuani

Traditional Sejuani

Zac –reworked

Cell Division (Passive)

Each time Zac hits an enemy with an ability, he sheds a chunk of Goo that can be reabsorbed to restore [4% of his maximum health].

Upon taking fatal damage, Zac splits into 4 bloblets that attempt to recombine. If any bloblets remain after [8/7/6/5/4 at levels 1/6/10/14/17] seconds, he will revive with 10-50% health depending on the health of the surviving bloblets. Each bloblet has 12% of Zac’s maximum health, and 50% of his Armor and Magic Resistance. This ability has a 300 second cooldown.

Stretching Strikes (Q)

Cost: 4% of current Health

Cooldown: 12/11/10/9/8 seconds

Zac’s arm stretches and grabs the first enemy it hits, dealing 50/70/90/110/130 (+30% AP) magic damage and briefly slowing them. Zac’s next basic attack is replaced with a long range smack that repeats the initial magic damage and slow effect.

If Zac grabs a different enemy with each attack he’ll throw them towards each other, dealing 50/70/90/110/130 (+30% AP) magic damage in an area if they collide.

Can be cancelled by moving, refunding half of the ability’s cooldown and cost.

Let’s Bounce! (R)

No cost

Cooldown: 130/115/100 seconds

First cast:

Zac squishes himself down, making him immune to Crowd Control for up to 2.5 seconds. Any enemies standing on top of him are slowed by 30/40/50%.

Second cast:

Charging for at least 1 second before recasting causes Zac to scoop up enemies on top of him, carrying them towards the target location 700/850/1000 units. While flying through the air Zac is Unstoppable. Upon landing nearby enemies take 150/250/350 (+70% AP) magic damage and are briefly slowed.

Reactivating before Zac charges up knocks back nearby enemies instead.

Kinda needs to be seen to be believed:

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Patch 7.9 Champion Changes

General:

Every champion who had no Magic Resist growth before, now has 0.5.

No further champion changes yet, but wait for it.

Patch 7.9 Item Changes

Huge item changes in 7.9, including two totally new ones.

Adaptive Helm–new!

Gargoyle Stoneplate–new!

Besides this, a huge number of items are being changed in patch 6.9. Starting support items are having quests added to make their play more interesting. Details on this available on the forums.

On quests, each line of items are getting a different quest. Here’s the deets:

Ancient Coin, Nomad’s Medallion, Talisman of Ascension, Eye of Oasis:

Quest: Earn 650 gold using this item and upgrade to Nomad’s Medallion.

Reward: Favor is upgraded to Emperor’s Favor and you receive an Elixir of Skill.

Relic Shield, Targon’s Brace, Face of the Mountain, Eye of the Equinox:

LoL Patch 7.9 Rift Herald Changes

The biggest girl on the Rift is getting significant reworks with the midseason update, changing Biggles Crabson from a mostly ignored roadblock on the way to Baron to a lane-pushing, Heroes of the Storm-style PvE objective that will almost certainly be in big demand. Here’s the highlights:

Now spawns once per game.

When defeated will drop an eye, that can be collected as an item and used to summong Rift Herald to push a lane.

All new art, as seen above.

The encounter is being made slightly easier, so it is soloable by skillful players. You’ll still need to be paying attention to do it, but it’s now possible. A partner is still recommended. The encounter also has various added elements to make it more ‘epic’ and interesting, but they’re avoidable again through decent play.

While pushing a lane, she’s meant to take down multiple turrets if protected, but be easy to beat with a coordinated team if she’s going solo. Expect your team to never protect or defend against her. Obviously.

LoL Patch 7.9 New Skins

Second most important: cosmetics. Lovely, gorgeous cosmetics. Bit more of a visual medium this, so we’ve grabbed the best videos of each skin, as well as a lovely pic or two. Some are relatively simple changes, while others are total reworks of every part of the champion outside the gameplay numbers – new VO, new animations, new particles and the rest. It’s generally defined by how much they cost, so we’ve detailed that as well.

Dark Star Kha’Zix

Dark Star Orianna

Corruptant Ward

As with most skin packs these days, the Dark Stars come with their own ward. Here’s a vid:

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It’ll be 640 RP or likely be available as part of a pack.

Dark Star Game Mode

There’s also talk of a game mode – we’ve got all the details in our dedicated post. Further explanations straight from Riot here.

Guess Who’s Back? (It’s Graves’ Cigar)

The above asset, along with a couple others containing the shotgun-wielding pseudo-cowboy and his favourite puffer, were added during this PBE cycle. This follows a mysterious tweet from Riot co-founder Marc ‘Tryndamere’ Merrillcontaining the grizzly one’s cigared visage. Presumably, it’s making a comeback.

LoL Patch 7.9 Login Screen

Each patch has its own login screen with unique music. They’re always fairly excellent, and 7.9’s is no exception. It’s based around the new pair of Dark Star skins and is especially spooky.

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LoL Patch 7.9 UI Updates

Riot are doing a pass on the UI, especially as it relates to the utility contributions of teams – putting out stuns, giving vision, killing structures, tanking damage, etc. This is all laid out, along with some other changes, in this forum post.

LoL Patch 7.9 developer notes

A new section for our patch posts this – we’ll be dropping in any relevant thoughts from various folks at Riot. Of note this go round is Andrei ‘Meddler’ Van Roon withthoughtson where they’ll be focusing balance efforts and what they’ll be keeping an eye on from this patch. Of note:

The three major redesigns, along with the major new items, quests and Rift Herald. Obviously.

Rakan and Xayah are doing okay so won’t be receiving any balance updates, yet anyway.

League of Legends Missions

These aren’t rolling out in 7.9, but have been added to the PBE. Via this Red post, Riot are essentially implementing event-based rewards in-game, rather than having to claim via other websites or them checking everything a few weeks later and auto-adding anything earned. It will be revealed properly “in the coming weeks” but [email protected] have a preview of the strings involved.

That’s League of Legends patch 7.9. We’ll update as and when we get more info, or we’ll see you for patch 7.10 in the very near future. Let us know below if there’s any vital info we missed!